There is an alternative medium that doesn't get the attention it deserves: point of sale. Obviously, it's a consumer touch point and a setting for merchandising and transactions. But it's a medium, too. Approaching it as a medium involves a whole new way of thinking about how to interact with consumers wandering the aisles. It's not just about retailing. It's also about communication.

We should all believe in the power of dreams. For this December yearend issue, I thought it would be appropriate to look back at a campaign which has had the most holistic, inventive, and transformative marketplace effect. It represents not only my selection, but almost every awards jury selection, as the best "new next" of the year. We can also look forward and hope that campaigns like this set a new benchmark in 2006, and that they serve to inspire a new world of optimism, inventiveness, and creativity.

As demand rises for more accurate reach and frequency estimates for ad schedules using multiple forms of media, researchers are turning to various types of data integration and fusion techniques. This column focuses on the rationale for using such approaches, the assumptions underlying these approaches, and the best way they can be evaluated in terms of their utility and accuracy.

You can feel the tremors. A major earthquake is about to disrupt television as we know it. This year, the piping companies are working hard to replace the old platforms of broadcast, cable, and satellite with Internet portals. Verizon and SBC Communications made major investments to build Internet TV portals. Comcast recently reacted by telling Wall Street about its own Internet TV portal under development that will be fully stocked with programs, movies, interactive features, and a new-fangled television search engine. Then Comcast created more buzz with hints of partnership talks with Google and interest in acquiring a piece of ...

What's your aperture moment? Over the past months we've explored consumer aperture moments -- the windows in which people are most receptive to receiving your message. Sometimes the best way to explore the value and application of a concept is to put it within the context of our own life experience.

Back in the carefree days of the cold war, one of the greatest pieces of literature -- as instructive as literature gets in revealing the real truths in life-- was George Orwell's Animal Farm. The allegory of farm animals throwing out the humans, and in due course taking on all the traits of human frailty, insecurity, and power-grabbing, offered concise parallels in the hypocrisy of totalitarian and/or communist regimes. It was required reading for high school and college students around the nation.

University libraries are quickly going digital. But plans by Google to offer fully searchable databases of digitized books have spurred controversy. The Google Print program has come under fire from authors and publishers because the search giant wants to scan copyrighted material for the databases. Google paused temporarily this summer to allow publishers and authors to "opt out" of having their works scanned, but the trade organizations objected, saying the company must obtain their permission to scan the materials in the first place. Google resumed the scanning process on Nov. 1. "This is a plain and brazen ...

One rainy Saturday afternoon, I scurried along 7th Avenue, cursing as my hair blew into a Medusa-like mess and my umbrella flipped inside-out. Upon arriving at the Chelsea Whole Foods Market, I didn't grab a cart or drool over the cookies as usual; instead, I descended to the store's netherworld. As a frequent Whole Foods shopper, I'd always wondered how the New York City stores found customers to pose for the candid ad campaigns that hang in store windows (and float on some cash register screens). Because it's believable that the "models" shop at the store, and the posters ...

By the time you read this article, five leading media agencies will be making better decisions about which channels work best for their clients' brands than they were just two months earlier. The reason? Compose, a new channel-planning software tool, designed by Kantar Media Group and built by Pointlogic, with substantial input from the project's five charter subscribers: Carat, Initiative, Mediaedge:CIA, Mindshare, and PHD.

You know that fresh feeling you get in the first few days of a new year? Resolutions not yet broken. Hopes not yet dashed. Everything seems somehow newer and better. To start the New Year off on the right foot, here's my list of unreasonable things I wish would just go away.